A month into the season, it’s a ridiculous statement—until you look at the Big Ten and at what Urban Meyer is building at Ohio State.

Ohio State, serving a year of NCAA probation, may not lose this fall.

“We’ve got a good thing going right now,” Meyer said after his Buckeyes won at Michigan State 17-16 in their Big Ten opener. “That was a gutsy effort.”

Gutsy enough to force that unthinkable unbeaten talk for a team that lost seven games last year—and returned a majority of the same players from that team. The transformation—and a 5-0 start—is probably equal parts Meyer and a struggling Big Ten.

The reality is Saturday’s win at Michigan State was likely Ohio State’s toughest game of the season. There will be other tests—Purdue and an underrated defense; Wisconsin in Madison; Michigan in the season finale—but the Buckeyes likely will be favored in all of them.

Ohio State can’t play in the BCS National Championship Game, or the Big Ten Championship Game. But it can still be ranked in the Associated Press poll—and can be ranked No.1 at the end of the season.

That’s a long way off, but if the Ohio State defense plays like it did against the Spartans, and quarterback Braxton Miller continues his Heisman Trophy-worthy season, the Buckeyes could be the first team since Auburn in 1993 to finish a season unbeaten while on probation.

To get there, Ohio State must do a better job of running the ball from the tailback spot, and taking pressure off Miller. He has carried the ball 90 times already this season (18 carries a game), including 23 carries (for 136) yards against the Spartans.

He tweaked his knee on one of those carries, and there was so much concern that trainers did an ACL test that was negative. Without Miller, this team loses four or five games. With him, they may not lose.

The more Ohio State wins, the more team chemistry galvanizes a group that had nothing to play for when the season began.